CHAPTER XX.
"LAST SCENE OF ALL—1843-60-70—THAT ENDS THIS STRANGE, EVENTFUL HISTORY."
Soon after the suits with Mr. Paris the Chief left the township forever, and for a few years lived in the city of Hamilton, in a small cottage purchased from Sir Allan McNab. In 1843 he left Hamilton for Scotland, having come into a small estate in the Orkneys. His enjoyment of the estate was of short continuance. Running through the property in a few years by lavish and profuse expenditure, he, in 1859, retired to France, living on a small pittance granted to him by his lady, from whom he had separated in 1819. On the 22nd of April, 1860, the Laird of McNab—the last legitimate Chief of the Clan McNab—was summoned before his Almighty Judge. He died at Lanion, a small fishing-village near Boulogne, in the 82nd year of his age. Twenty-eight years have rolled away since his death. Forty-seven years have passed over since he finally quitted the township, and what a change! After the final victory obtained by Mr. Paris, the people set to work with energy and vigor. New settlers flocked to the township. Left to the management of their own affairs by the Municipal Act of Mr. Baldwin, roads began to be improved and bridges erected. In 1855 a new bridge was constructed over the Madawaska River at Balmer Island, through the energy and exertions of Mr. Paris, the Reeve, and the assessed value of the township was yearly increased. In 1848 the dispute between the Presbyterian Churches in Scotland reached the Scottish townships on the Ottawa, and McNab, among the rest, was affected with the religious epidemic. A large portion of the people broke off from Mr. Mann's congregation. Two new congregations were formed at Burnstown and White Lake, and in 1849 the Rev. S. C. Fraser was inducted as the new pastor. This charge he held until the spring of 1868, when he resigned.
In 1852 Arnprior, which had been a dilapidated scene of log-house ruins, began to revive under the auspices of Mr. Daniel McLachlin, who that year purchased the property from the Messrs. Middleton, of Liverpool. When it came into his possession it wore a most dreary aspect. The dam built by the Buchanans had been torn down—the grist-mill had entirely disappeared—the saw-mill was a shattered ruin, and all that stood was the tavern then occupied by Mr. James Hartney. The property was surveyed into town lots. The dam was rebuilt for Mr. McLachlin by the Hincks Government in 1853, and the saw-mill was renovated and put into operation. A stone grist-mill was erected—mechanics, operatives, and laborers were encouraged to settle by the most alluring prospects—and in 1854 the sound of workmen's implements, the blows of the axe clearing the surrounding forest, the hammering of the carpenters and the ringing strokes of the blacksmiths' sledges on the various anvils reminded one of the classic days of Queen Dido when busily occupied in the building of ancient Carthage, so beautifully described in the Æneid of Virgil. Now Arnprior may boast of its three thousand inhabitants. Then only two families occupied the neglected waste. A few short years has effected this prosperous change, and Mr. McLachlin's stone mansion is situated on the terraced banks of the majestic Ottawa, on the very site of Kennell Lodge, where the Chief of McNab once ruled a supreme despot, unchecked and uncontrolled. Then an order from the Chief was tantamount to a law and was obeyed with alacrity. Then the township of McNab was thinly peopled, having only 102 inhabitants all told; now, including Arnprior, it can number upwards of 6,500. Then the people were poor, struggling for a miserable existence, ground down by oppression; now the great majority are independent, and many are in affluent circumstances. Then McNab was the poorest and most miserably wretched township on the Ottawa; now its assessed value is by far the greatest of any municipality in the County of Renfrew. It may be said to be the empire township of the County. Had the contemplated feudal system been carried out—had the attempt and the actual existence of the tenure not been resisted, and resisted too by the most heroic struggle ever carried on by an impoverished people against wealth and power—it would have been in the same languishing condition as the most besotted portions of degraded Spain, or in the same wretched state as those parts of Ireland where oppression has not been tempered by law or justice, and where Fenianism has taken the place of order to redress grievances which constitutional measures alone can remove.
In 1838 the first school was established in the township; now we have numerous educational establishments and a Grammar School—all of a high order. In 1839 the first Presbyterian congregation was formed.
Our history has now drawn to a close. We have endeavored, without partiality or bias, to give a true record of what has taken place, and we trust we have done so to the satisfaction of our readers. At great pains to select documents to substantiate matters of fact, we grudge not the labor, so that we have made this history interesting as well as instructive—interesting as a memento of the past; instructive as tending to impress upon our legislators caution in the opening up of new country, and in the formation of new settlements. Now that the great North-west is being opened up for immigration, the Government may take warning from the past, and not entrust the power which the Chief of McNab at one time wielded, to any single individual. Canada is too powerful, too great, too constitutional in the genius and intelligence of her people, ever again to permit a Family Compact to reign over them—an oligarchy which for years governed Canada so badly that our beloved sovereign, the great and beneficent Victoria, herself generously interfered, and sent statesmen that uprooted this abominable autocracy that for years had been bane to the progress of the country, and a drag on the prosperity of Canada; yet by carelessness grievances may creep in, but if they do, this history will at all events teach statesmen to listen to and investigate the slightest complaint from individuals, however humble and poor, lest the disgrace which overwhelmed the Family Compact in their dealings with the Laird of McNab be their fate, and their political destruction be pronounced by the fiat of public opinion which has changed the destinies of empires, and sealed the fate of the most powerful dynasties in the world.
[THE END.]
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